Odisha tourism starts witnessing a recovery

Thursday, September 30, 2021

The Odisha tourism industry, which was in doldrums since last year due to the pandemic, has started seeing a recovery with most hotels witnessing promising occupancy of visitors.

A drop in Covid infections, along with easing of restrictions, has brought back tourists to their favorite destinations. Most hotels in Puri and Bhubaneswar, which used to witness around 20% to 30% occupancy in September, usually thought to be a lean tourist season, is now seeing the occupancy levels rising to 60%.

“Tourism has revived much faster than expected. Corporate businesses have also picked up. At the Swosti Hotel in Chilika, the weekend occupancy is almost 100% and on other days it’s 60%. The situation is the same in Bhubaneswar. We have been flooded with mails and enquiries from tourists, who want to visit the state in the coming days,” said J K Mohanty, the chairman of the Hotel and Restaurant Association of Odisha (HRAO).

“The hotels in Puri are fully occupied. We had never before witnessed 60% occupancy in hotels in September. It is a positive sign for the tottering tourism industry. Depressed after staying indoors during the lockdown, people have started travelling to Puri from different districts of the state and neighbouring West Bengal, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand with a vengeance,” said Debasis Kumar, the vice-president of the Hotel Association of Puri. Footfall of tourists in Puri has increased after the reopening of the Jagannath Temple for all on August 23.

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